our house has a swear jar. anyone caught using swears (e.g. damn, shit) or even simple potty words, sometimes called bathroom words, (e.g. penis, butt, nummers) may be called out and penalized. i know many homes with growing children employ this tactic to bring awareness to the use of such words, attempting to make their children more aware of their place in the vocabulary/society. our operation has the slight twist to typical installments in that bella began and governs our swear jar. what drove bella to this drastic, even if unoriginal (unless your qualify a child starting it), response is she is the last one in our house to giggle at creatively blended strings of potty words or lavishly crafted scenarios about bathroom happenings by her two younger brothers ... or her father ... and even sometimes her mother.

many a night bella has sat at the dinner table appalled at her brothers conversation and hysterical laughing at some extra-juvenile story. when she looks to me to correct and scold the boys, she may find me laughing right along side or even congratulating one of their boys for their detailed recounting. extra-exasperated she turns to her gender-comrade in arms only to find her with her head bowed and a hand covering her face trying to hide her laughter. in one of these moments bella, with all but a fist slamming on the table, called our behavior outrageous, and wholly embarrassing, and what if she had a friend over, and then she declared that going forward, people caught using such words, especially at our family dinner table, would have to pay a penalty, the amount to be determined by the offended party. i broke the unusually long post-proclamation silence (in an equally unoriginal move) by pledging five dollars to this swear jar and told bella to see my people when the balance was exhausted. more hysterics. while she didn't appreciate the added laughter she was quick and glad to accept her foundation's first funds.

it time, and after seeing she intended on enforcing her policy, after she'd announce something like, "ok alex. you owe the swear jar seventy five cents for that story" i came to the aid of my family. using my paternal authority, i proclaimed an amendment to the swear jar mandate. it was this: if the person telling the story can make bella laugh while using an offending word, the teller doesn't have to pay the fine. at first bella said fine because she would not laugh at such childish attempts at humor. but what she didn't prepare herself for was how the tales and descriptions would grow, as a desperate storyteller fought to get bella to crack a smile. the details became wild and grandiose and the imitations of sounds and shrieks became remarkably believable and piercing. this extra effort has saved the accused many a coin as for all bella's propriety and blossoming maturity, she too is a storyteller at heart and can't help but appreciate a good and spirited yarn full of juicy words and pulsing images.

over a decade ago i made the decision to close my kid's dedicated photo galleries after their fifth birthday (and one hundred photos). now that anthony has crested both of those milestones i find myself without an outlet to capture and share the occasional image of my people. while maintaining this website over the past twelve years has tortured me in a number of ways, it has also spoiled me in many more. my expedient ability to fix this sudden case of the jitters being one of the good sides. thus, allow me to introduce you to our family scrapbook.

to continue health week here at dearmitt dot com, i have another morsel to share. i'm always listening out for people who have personal experience and insights about prostate matters. this is a dark tunnel all men who live long enough will one day be ushered into, and there seems to be a bit of flux in the knowledge at hand.

after telling my new hair guy, jerry, about my pending knee work i asked if he ever had any surgeries. dismissively he said, "nah. i just had my prostate out a few years back." as the word 'prostate' got floated out there, the guy in my head responsible for watching for things i care about gave my brain a hard nudge and told it, sharply, to get off its ass. i was ravenous. how old was he when it started? how was it detected? how hard were the decisions? what was the aftermath? i'm most interested in that last question as i hear conflicting things about periods and levels of recovery.

many of jerry's (and yes, i've noted that my new hair guy's name is a rhymer (how anfer would say it) with the infamous and ever-missed larry) stories begin, "well, i have this customer who is a fill in the needed occupation so i asked him...". when his prostate journey began, one of his customers told him to go check out this new facility in the county. the customer described it as not much more than a prostate chop shop. it's all they did, and per jerry, they did a lot of it. from the crack of dawn to the dip of dusk, this well-oiled, or perhaps vaselined, operation worked until their buckets spilled over with the fouled or suspect organs. what was special about this place was they used these fancy new machines, called a da vinci machine, designed to do nothing but cull prostates from paying customers. the machine looks like a five legged spider, hovers over a sleeping patient and is controlled by a doc sitting twenty feet away. when people who have used this new system compare notes with people who used old-school methods, it is a hands down drubbing (in favor of the inventor's namesake).

the mechanized procedure is more officially termed a da vinci prostatectomy (more).
when i told marty about it, she explained the reason it may do better than than conventional means is that when a human works on you, they have to make room for their hands to manuever so end up disrupting and thus damaging a lot more healthy tissue than the robotic arms which could burrow through the sensitive tissue, excise the organ and back out leaving nary a trace of its adventure. as my hair guy said, he had friends who were hospitalized for ten days and still ginger after six weeks from the traditional method, and he, my hair guy, was in and out in thirty six hours and back cutting hair in two weeks (albeit with the occasional break).

i asked jerry for any final advice he'd give to someone with this in their future. at this question he lowered his scissors, moved into my view, and with animated hand gestures told of another patient who asked the same question weeks before getting the procedure. jerry said, "i told him one thing ... get a bucket." he elaborated that after the procedure they catheterize you (serious bitch he adds) and give you this bag to carry around. he said he tried using the velco calf connectors and even wearing cargo-pocketed pants but in the end just ended up going into the basement and grabbing a bucket, throwing the always getting fuller bag in and just plodded around the house carrying his handled-bucket with him. unless he had to go out in public, which he wasn't in much mood for, he didn't mess with any of those ill-conceived antics. regarding what his buddy thought of his advice. since then any of his friends who say they're getting the prostate business, shortly before their procedure he appears before their door and gives them a gift: a shiny new bucket with a christmas bow on it.

i think my reason for talking so much about health the last few days (mon, tue) is i had knee surgery yesterday. same knee as before but a far less intense procedure. i tweaked it playing tennis about a month back. the swelling and discomfort were enough to send me back to my knee guy. after an exam, x-ray, and mri, they discovered a sizable loose-body of cartilage floating around. this whimsical shard was the source of much of my discomfort as it repeatedly parked itself in places the rest of my knee did not expect such a particle to be double-parked (inconsiderate ass that it, the floater, is).

during the pre-op prep and before they allowed marty back to wait with me, the nurse said, "i'm required by law to ask you this: do you have a safe place to go home to after you are discharged?" a crazed array of images—some of bella, some of anthony, some of marty, and NONE of aleo—ran through my head. this was the only answer i paused on. in fact i paused so long, the woman looked away from the computer screen to glance at me, mildly annoyed. i smiled and said, no i had a lovely and colorful home to return to.

later, after marty joined me, the anaesthesia guy explained the "cocktail" he had planned. one of the courses included what he called an "animal-grade amnesia" solution which would make me forget anything that happened after he administered it and before he knocked me out. after he left, marty and i debated if he really used the term animal-grade or if he said something else that just sounded like "animal-grade".

when they announced it was time, marty gave me a kiss, said she loved me and asked me not to die. as my bed made its wheeled journey towards the operating room, i had the following conversation with the anaesthesia guy who was pushing the bed and positioned just behind me, out of sight:

TROY
they knocked me out sooner last time and i didn't remember going down this hall.

ANAESTHESIA GUY
nah, it's the same. you will forget this little trip when you wake up.

TROY
i won't forget. i'm remembering it right now.

ANAESTHESIA GUY (jokingly)
it's smart to not believe the professional who does this everyday.

TROY
wait. earlier did you say you were going to give me an animal grade amnesiac?

ANAESTHESIA GUY
i did.

TROY
and that's why i won't remember?

ANAESTHESIA GUY
yes.

TROY
my wife didn't believe that's what you said.

ANAESTHESIA GUY
i seem to be batting a thousand in your house.

TROY
for the record, i believed you about the animal grade amnesia-juice.

ANAESTHESIA GUY
but not the memory stuff.

TROY
uhh. yeah.

ANAESTHESIA GUY
i'd recommend trusting the guy with his fingers on the plungers.

while i do want to believe him, i obviously remembered this exchange down the hallway as it is eight hours later and i'm typing it up for your enjoyment. although i will say the guy put me out moments after that exchange. now talk about your cherry job perks, being able to silence anyone you find irksome due to their disagreeing personalities.

as i write this, the jaggy bit of flotsam is no longer flitting about my knee joint. and after a bit of rest i'm back to rehab then off to be fitted for a fancy new-age leg brace meant to reduce friction-based injuries from impact or cut-based activities. you'll note, the super-doc nabbed the floater out but didn't do anything about the hole it had occupied. we're going to try the brace but are possibly in for something a touch more intense down the line (e.g. cartilage grafts or, get this, a fitted cadaver plug).

another detail for the record, leading up to my procedure three years ago, my biggest worry was dying during the procedure. as i hadn't been under full anaesthesia for twenty years, i feared i may prove allergic to what are surely new medications or possibly i would learn some part of my body (e.g. heart, lungs) was not what it once was and one of them might go sideways in some unexpected manner. obviously, none of the scenarios occurred. i didn't even suffer from the threat of post-operative puking which they warned us about (and as you would expect, i warned them that they were toying with a thirty year vomit-free run). this time, my largest anxiety before they put my down was peeing during the procedure ... or worse. while some folks look to replace disproven irrational/paranoid arguments with healthier notions, i view the irrational medium as something to be specialized in, surprising any still willing to listen with my unprecedented ability to swap paranoid and silly beliefs with even more confused and sad ones. call it a hobby of sorts.

i'd be remiss to not name the largest victim of this injury. and it is surprisingly not marty. while she obviously shoulders a tremendous uptick in work and hassle, the biggest loser this time is my ski mancation with bookguy. and the most scandalous part of it all is weeks before last year's outing, bookguy took a tumble on his bike (surely doing something ill-advised) and nixed our 2011 boondoogle. this means we're now in a two year funk due to our weekend-warrior mentalities. after this year's news broke, we made a gentleman's agreement to embargo ourselves from taxing physical endeavors in the months leading up to our ski date. because while age may not make for more resilient bodies, it should at least produce minds that are, if nothing else, significantly wiser. if we can't learn to pick that meat from the bone, aging is sure to be an arduous and unforgiving bitch.

( please note, this post was crafted under the influence of the miracle drug vicodan to which any spikes in mis-spellings, confusion or creativity may be attributed. )

a couple times a year i try out a few new magazines. while i enjoy reading the content and studying their pixel perfect layouts, what i enjoy most about magazines is the newsstand experience (good newsstands at least), with its rows and columns of shiny and new. it's clear lots have people have been busy.

initially, i had started writing a gripe about how i find the letter from the editor in most magazines to be boorish and less thoughtful than it seemed like it maybe should be, but i just deleted it. i decided that instead of being critical of most—and who the hell am i to say anyway—i'd compliment the one i enjoy most: David Zinczenko of men's health. he has a style and approach that i find unassuming and real. i imagine him obsessively toiling over his next topic, searching for that one story or experience from his past that will best illuminate the spirit of the pending issue. i imagine these final epiphanies come while he's shiny with exertion from one of his many activities. while i appreciate some might not deem him inspiring, i think we could agree he takes his space seriously and works hard to fill it with relevant reflections from his life. and in the end, that's all any of us can conscientiously ask.

a former student of mine, super-sam, recently dropped in for dinner with us. as the adult conversation hit its stride the kids tuned out of the boring side of the table and chatted and goofed among themselves. this time though, my guest, caught the kids ears when he said he was interviewing for a job with a game development company. surprising everyone at the table, after this comment was made, alex spoke up interrupting sam and asked what he just said. sam repeated his hope and intention to get a job making video games. to this alex started asking sam if he's heard of many of the games alex has been playing. it was a hit and miss list. in time the conversation moved on.

a few days later alex handed me a letter. i thanked him and started opening it thinking it was another one for me. sensing my mistake alex said, "it's not for you dad. it's for that boy, that boy that is going to make games. it is some ideas morgan and i had of games he can make." sam, who went on to get the job, hasn't even been assigned a desk yet and already has a creative team doing his bidding. truth told, i expected no less.

firstly, alex is not good with names. he just calls most people who visit our house "that boy" or "that girl" so that he put a male name in that spot at all is a bit surprising. marty caught the mistake and had him fix it, but he only corrected the name on the outside of the envelope where it said "opin". additionally, you can't expect the creatives to have to bother with unimportant things like their boss or client's name. they have more pressing neurons to tend to. and speaking of creativity, i'm not sure if the world is ready for exploding babies yet but if it is, with the insight shared in this napkin pitch, sam may get the jump on the market. the letter transcribed and corrected follows:

hi david. i want to tell you me and my friend morgan made up two funny games. bablyliss war and babies vs parents. in bablyliss war there are buildings and baby guns and baby swords or nothing (meaning they would punch) will fight against ninjas, armies, aliens, wizards and people with swords. and babies vs parents is just like plants versus zombies.

on the second game idea, i'd guess they either ran out of creative steam or morgan's mom called and said it was dinnertime.

i can't tell you the number of events we've been late too because we can't find a child's shoes. this has happened with all of them but these days anthony, given his age (5), is the usual culprit.

i can't tell you the number of times we said, your shoes have a home, please see that they get in that home so you know where they are when you need/want them again. it's a plea/declaration/mandate/threat that's been called through the house so many times i'm a little shocked the children don't mockingly pantomime our words as we huff them out.

i can't tell you the number of bizarre configurations in which shoes have been discovered. it's not like, oh here they are under the coffee table. it's more like one shoe is in the top bunk of the second bedroom and the other shoe, its matcher, is in the third row seat of the van parked in front of the house. these searches are definitely part of the advanced set of problems.

i can't tell you how surprised i was when the i looked in the bin and saw that anthony had finally, with only one ask, put his shoes in their home, which for him is also the family sock basket.

and i can't tell you how my expression fell when i saw his just put-away shoes were covered, ankle-high, with fresh, sludgy mud as they rested atop all of our laundered and paired socks.

after all the hours spent alone, it is rather nice to have a swim buddy.

bella has been between sporting endeavors (girls on the run and indoor soccer). to bridge the gap in the winter months i suggested she join me for swimming. she agreed and even sounded eager, that is until i told her to suit up because it was time to go. this was met with a surprised, "what? now?". after marty helped her get her stuff together we met in the foyer to head out. as i opened the door bella stopped me and asked:

BELLA
how long are we going to be there?

TROY
an hour.

BELLA
an hour! can i take a book?

TROY
no you can't take a book.

BELLA
why not?

TROY
because you're going to be swimming.

BELLA
for the whole hour?

the answer, of course, was yes for the whole hour. i told bella i would explain how it worked during the walk there. to this she said, "WE'RE WALKING!". the answer to this, of course, was again yes we were walking.

after we arrived to the pool, changed in our respective locker rooms, and met at a lane, bella was heard to say the following things during the experience:

ok. so maybe i'm glad i didn't bring my book. this is fun. (her giddiness was largely due to the discovery that she, at ten, could swim faster than me. i wish i had a worthy excuse but the girl seems to have about four gears i'm missing).

i thank you for not wearing a swim suit like the guy in the next lane. (he was in a speedo. after glancing over i told bella i was sure everyone at the pool was thankful i didn't wear a speedo).

next week ... (i'm intensely glad she's excited about next week)

they were from another country so they couldn't help me. (when i sent her into the locker room, since it was her first time at this gym, i told her to ask someone in there to point her to the general use lockers. the only girls in the locker room were part of a basketball team from another university and didn't know what to tell her. bella deems anyone not from our town to be from another country.).

marty brought the boys to the gym while we were still in the pool. there was a basketball tournament going on and we were going to watch some of the games after our swim. they watched us for a little bit from the windowed observation deck before heading to the gym. after the swim and the game when walking home, i asked alex what he thought of me and bella swimming and if he'd like to do it when he gets his skills up a bit more. he said, "no i don't really want to jump off the diving board." alex has connected swimming laps to going off the diving board because swimming a lap is a pre-diving board requirement of our summer pool. i guess he thinks bella and i really, really, really want to go off the diving board given all the laps we swim.

imagine if you were asked to write about a runaway horse crashing into a family's wagon on a narrow wooden bridge. would your rendition be close to this?

the horse still galloping, galloping its shadow into the dust, the road descending now toward the creek and the bridge. It was of wood, just wide enough for a single vehicle. When the horse reached it, it was occupied by a wagon coming from the opposite direction and drawn by two mules already asleep in the harness and the soporific motion. On the seat were Tull and his wife, in splint chairs in the wagon behind them sat their four daughters, all returning belated from an all-day visit with some of Mrs . Tull's kin. The horse neither checked nor swerved. It crashed once on the wooden bridge and rushed between the two mules which waked lunging in opposite directions in the traces, the horse now apparently scrambling along the wagon-tongue itself like a mad squirrel and scrabbling at the end-gate of the wagon with its fore feet as if it intended to climb into the wagon while Tull shouted at it and struck at its face with his whip. The mules were now trying to turn the wagon around in the middle of the bridge. It slewed and tilted, the bridge-rail cracked with a sharp report above the shrieks of the women; the horse scrambled at last across the back of one of the mules and Tull stood up in the wagon and kicked at its face. Then the front end of the wagon rose, flinging Tull, the reins now wrapped several times about his wrist, backward into the wagon bed among the overturned chairs and the exposed stockings and undergarments of his women. The pony scrambled free and crashed again on the wooden planking, galloping again. The wagon lurched again; the mules had finally turned it on the bridge where there was not room for it to turn and were now kicking themselves free of the traces. When they came free, they snatched Tull bodily out of the wagon. He struck the bridge on his face and was dragged for several feet before the wrist-wrapped reins broke. Far up the road now, distancing the frantic mules, the pony faded on. While the five women still shrieked above Tull's unconscious body, Eck and the little boy came up, trotting, Eck still carrying his rope. He was panting. "Which way'd he go?" he said.

i've noticed a curious thing about my swimming endeavor. of all the annual learns i've ever taken on, never before have more people encouraged me to get a coach or proper lessons than with swimming. some after watching me and some after just hearing of what i'd been doing. they say it would do wonders for me. i've always resisted (without really knowing why). even after reading ben franklin's poor richard quip He that teaches himself, hath a fool for his master, i still resisted. over the year i've figured out my reluctance and it is this: i believe in the slow, methodical drip of ability that comes from contemplation, self-study, persistence, and doing. so while my stroke is still sloppy and not what it could be, it is better than it was a year ago. and it will be that much better next year and each year i keep focusing on it.

the above point admitted, i have allowed one person to offer me instruction. my unusual mentor is an always smiling, slightly chubby, ten year old asian boy. i get the sense his mom makes him come to the pool to swim laps, probably because of his weight. i've seen him at my indoor place a couple times as we appear to be on similar schedules. his face lights up when he sees me and he waves his arm to the space next to him inviting me to share his lane. it seems his stay is governed more by time than by laps as he is more interested in talking than swimming. when i pause between techniques he compliments parts of my stroke (your rotation is good) and makes suggestions of how it might improve (try to reach out farther in front of you). occasionally i'll ask him about something (should i be looking forward) and he'll casually say, "nah, that doesn't matter, look where you want." it must be his jovial ease that makes me drawn to his counsel. in part because when you're with someone as happy as he seems to be, you can't help but be a gram happier too.

for those wondering how i've been progressing, click through the below image for your answer.

i walk to work. it takes me about ten minutes from closing one door to opening the other. one of the best perks of this situation—and there are many—has been my ability to walk home for lunch. it recently occurred to me that this is the last school semester i can walk home and enjoy one of my children being there. and, after this academic semester concludes, i will never experience that routine luxury again. not to mention when marty goes back to work i won't even have the ability to share in my wife's company over my egg sandwich or butter tossed pasta.

when i shared this with marty over yesterday's workday lunch she, in classic marta form, expressed surprise that i wouldn't be happy giddy to have a quiet house again like back in our pre-kid days. i thought on that for a long moment realizing i too was a bit surprised at not seeing the long fought for upside of this milestone. i conclude it to be just another notch on the stick that marks how kids change you. it turns out there are so many notches chipped into my stick, every one added seems like it might break the once rugged object.

while my inclination is to sigh and sag over this realization, some watchdog in my head gives my brain a slap and barks at me to see my fortune in experiencing my young-young children or wife during the workday over the last eight years. after this gruff pep-talk i do sit up a bit straighter and the gloom fades, mostly.

later, that epiphany caused one of my three daily thankfuls (more on that soon) to be, "I'm thankful marty chose to stay home with our kids as the lifestyle she has afforded us, by not working, is second to none, truly."

and if there are downsides to living so close to home—and there are—the biggest one would be not having enough time in my commute to switch from the monastery-like quiet of my office to the frontline-like cacophony that is my home.

as his parent, i'm mildly curious if he deemed his button-job 'close enough' or 'too far-gone for help'

in looking for anthony's hundredth, and final, image for his personal gallery, i scanned my picture archives, wanting this last one to be solidly representative of his personality which i thought i managed for both baya and aleo. a few of his pics along the way have captured his spirit like here or here. after spinning through my folders though i didn't find any that hit the mark. so this last weekend i called him to the foyer asked him to stand on the landing thinking i had the chops to capture my son's essence, which is always about him.

what you're about to see is one of anthony's more peculiar takes on the world. he has it in his mind that when someone says they are going to take his picture, he, the subject, is supposed to strike and hold a series of poses, a different one for each picture. and as you'll see each and every one of his poses are without argument bizarre. i'm not sure what input or stimulus led him to create this repertoire of poses but whatever it was, i've never met a person who came to the same conclusion.

below are a few of the shots taken that day on the landing. after each beep from the camera he quickly and precisely re-contorts his body to the next chosen position. at the conclusion of the shoot, i didn't feel any of these hit the special mark i was looking for and i thought yesterday's image better captured the mood of our boy. but just because they weren't suitable to close out his gallery doesn't mean they're too highbrow for the monorail.

alex and i were cuddled up in our chair and a half reading. i thought of something i needed to note and started feeling my pockets for my pen (which i always try to have on me). realizing i didn't have it, alex began:

ALEO
whatcha lookin' for?

TROY
my pen. i need to write something down.

ALEO
i got ya dad. you can use mine.

with this last statement alex pulled the baseball hat he was wearing off, tipped it over and pulled a pen out of there and handed it to me as naturally as a personal banker might hand you a pen from their shirt pocket. ain't nothin' for an eight year old to prove more prepared than many adults i run into.

anthony initiated a most unexpected play-date. it was unexpected because it was with, of all things, a girl. i say unexpected because to date most of anthony's sentiments regarding the fairer gender have been more along the unoriginal, five-year old "i don't like girls--they are dumb" lines of logic. this time not only did he acknowledge this play-date, the morning of the play-date, he announced the following in the foyer while putting shoes on:

ANFER
i'm going to marry with edie.

(to this everyone in the family raised their head up from what they were doing)

BELLA
but i thought you were going to marry with me.

TROY
and i thought you were going to marry with mom.

ANFER
nope. now i'm marrying with edie.

MOM
does edie know this? usually both people have to agree to such an arrangement.

ANFER
yes she knows. yesterday at school i said i was going to marry with her and she said she was going to marry with me.

i would encourage edie to consider upon a longish courtship. this way she can see if anthony outgrows his near perpetual need to incorporate the word poop or penis or butt into every conversation, regardless of their contextual relevance. there are other points i could raise regarding a cautious entry into matrimony, i just don't think there's need to add evidence to an already sound position.

you may remember when bella took a break from her reading to describe me in my biking shorts as definitely not being eye candy. the next time i passed her geared up for my exercise, she stopped me long enough to say i had to stop walking around in those because i was now giving her "eye cavities". it's most evident they're cute when they're young by design. many wouldn't make it otherwise.